Sat, 10 Jul 1999

Discrimination against Chinese

When returning to Indonesia from abroad, I was asked to fill out a customs declaration form.

Questions number 11 to 15 needed to be answered with a "yes" or "no". One particular question struck me as odd, i.e. question number 14. The question asked me if I was carrying narcotics, fire arms, ammunition, lasers, explosives, pornography, Chinese printing, Chinese medicines, transceivers or cordless telephones. All these items under question number 14 are classified as prohibited goods.

I would like to ask the concerned authorities why Chinese printing and Chinese medicines are considered prohibited goods, and grouped together with drugs, weapons and pornography? How about communist literature printed in other languages?

LISA WATI

Jakarta